This Explains Everything
by Megera
Summary: Well, it explains a couple of things =0) A quick little fic about Pounce and his height


Disclaimer: I own nothing relating to Cats.

This Explains Everything

"C'mon guys! Give it back!"

"If you want it, come and get it!" the toy mouse flew through the air and was promptly caught by Tumblebrutus.

"Yeah, Pouncie! Just grab it!" again the mouse was airborne.

Plato waved the toy at Pouncival, who tried to snatch it. Plato quickly jerked the mouse above his head, far from the reach of the youngest tom kitten.

"This isn't funny! I want my mouse!"

"Aw, he wants his mouse!" Tumblebrutus cooed.

"Shut up!" Pouncival made another attempt to leap at the toy.

"Kittens!" all three toms stopped abruptly and turned to see Jennyanydots glaring at him. "That's not very nice. Boys, give Pounce his toy back."

Scowling, Plato tossed the trinket at the very embarrassed tom. 

"That's better," Jenny said, nodding. "Now, play nicely, will you?"

The toms were quite until the gumbie cat was out of earshot.

"You big baby." Tumble growled. "Had to have Jenny protect you."

"Shut up!" Pounce said, for felt like the millionth time.

"Let's go, Tumble. We don't wanna hang around with babies."

"I'm not a baby!"

"Whatever." the two toms smirked and ran off, leaving Pouncival alone with the toy he didn't feel much like playing with.

"I hate being little." he hissed.

"What?"  
Pounce turned to see Jemima approaching.

"Nothing." he mumbled.

"Did you say you ate seeing vittles?"

"I ate wh-? Jemi, that doesn't make any sense."

"Well, what did you say?"

"Nothing."

"You said something."

He rolled his eyes. "I said 'I hate being little', okay. You happy now?"

"Oh, is that all?"

"Is that all? Whatd'ya mean 'is that all'?"

"Being little is no big thing. No pun intended. Look at me, I'm little."

"Yeah, but you're a queen!" he pointed at her for emphasis.

"I'm aware of my gender, thank you, Pounce."

"Well, it's different for toms. Tumble and Plato are big."

"Yeah, big meanies."

"You don't understand."

"Oh, I understand plenty. I understand that you're sitting here all upset because you can't tease kittens smaller than you like those morons."

He sighed. "I just wanna be able to play the games they can, do the stuff they do, you know?"

"Sure, I mean, everyone-"

"Hey!" The Rum Tum Tugger interrupted Jemima's statement. "What's up, sweetie?" he made a kissie face at Jemima. "How's it going, shorty?"

"Shorty!" Pouncival jumped up.

"Yeah. How's it going?"

Pouncival just glared at the older tom for a moment before running off into the junkyard.

"You big jerk!" Tugger looked down in shock in time to see Jemima kick him sharply in the leg. "What'd ya have to go and do that for?!"

"Jem-"

"Now he's gonna run away or something!" Tugger resisted the urge to cover his ears. Her voice, so sweet when singing, was at a high, painful pitch and it completely threw him to have her, the shyest of the kittens so fierce. "Quit shooting off your mouth!" she hissed, before turning to run after the little tom.

"Uh-" Tugger tried to explain or apologize, although he wasn't quite sure what for, but Jemima was gone.

* * *

Pouncival ran straight out of the junkyard and into the streets He wandered for a while, not watching where he was going and cursing Tugger under his breath.

"Shorty. The big fluffy-"

"Hey!"

Pouncival jumped a good three feet in the air. "Who are you?" he asked, straining his eyes in the dark.

The other cat ignored the question. "Far from home, aren't you, friend?"

Pounce looked around. He was, in fact, rather far from the junkyard.

"I guess. What's it to you?"

"Just don't want to see you get hurt or something, that's all."

"I can take care of myself." the tom puffed out his chest and stood on his toes.

"I'm sure you can. But you gotta be hungry. It's around dinner time. Why don't you come back to my place for a bite, eh?"

Pounce was hungry, but he was a little unsure about following this stranger.

"I dunno. . . my mum wouldn't want me going off with someone I don't know."

"You're a Jellicle, right? From Old Deuteronomy's tribe?"

The kitten nodded.

"Well, me too."

"I've never seen you around before."

"I've been busy. What do you say, kid? Want something to eat?"

"I guess. . ." Pounce said slowly.

"Fantastic. Follow me!"

The cat lead the kitten through a maze of streets to a car garage with a cat flap in the door.

"Here we are. My flat." The cat darted through the little hole, followed closely by Pouncival.

The cat began making his way around the room, adjusting things, picking up bits of trash, and straitening up in general.

"Uh. . . I don't want to sound rude, but who are you?"

"Me?" it was too dark to see the facial expressions of the other cat but his voice suggested a smile. There was a click and a small lamp, which had been set on the floor, turned on.

"You can call me Rumpus Cat."

Pouncival's jaw dropped.

"The Rumpus Cat?"

Rumpus Cat nodded his head slightly.

"Oh boy! I've heard the coolest stories about you!"

"Most of them an exaggeration, I'm sure."

"Munkustrap tells us stories sometimes, when we're good."

"Who's us?"

"Me, and my frien-" he stopped and kicked at the ground. "These other kittens, Tumble and Plato. And the girls, too. Etcy, Vicki, Jemi and Electra."

"Ah. Care for some rabbit?" the black tom was bustling about like an old queen, setting dishes out.

"Sure. Thanks."

No problem. So tell me- what's your name, boy? I didn't catch it."

"Pouncival."

"So tell me Pouncival, why are you so far from home?"

"I. . . felt like taking a walk."

"You couldn't walk any closer to the junkyard?"

"I wanted to get away from the junkyard."

"Why?"

"I just did is all."

Rumpus Cat shifted and leaned closer to the kitten. "I've been around the block a few times. Who are you avoiding?"

Pouncival sighed. He hated how adults seemed to know everything.

"Tumble and Plato. And Tugger too."

The older cat snorted. He didn't think too much of the flirty tom. "Why?"

"They were teasing me. . .'causeI'mlittle " he rushed the end of his sentence.

"What? Gauze and vittles?"

"What the heck are vittles anyway?" Pounce sighed in exasperation. "'Cause I'm little."

"Oh, is that all?"

Pounce pounded the table with frustration. "Yes! That's all!"

"Calm down, kid. Being little isn't a big issue. No pun intended."

"Easy for you to say."

"Take it from me, there are worse things."

"Oh yeah? Like what?"

Rumpus Cat raised an eyebrow. "Pouncival, how tall do you think I am?"

The kitten looked the tom up and down.

"Uh. . . actually. . . you're not very big at all."

"I'm down right tiny. That wasn't the worst of my problems, though, when I was your age."

"Really? What was?"

Rumpus Cat stood up and began pacing. "Well, to start out with, my parents named me. . ." he grimaced. "Ted. The most average, everyday name of them all. I mean, 'Ted'. It sounds like some human lawyer or something. And besides that, look at me." he gestured to his body.

"Well . . ."

" Well, I don't look like any of the other cats in the 'yard, now do I?"

"Uh. . . no. Not at all." he said, looking at the tom's strange black coloring and funky fur.

"So you combine my goofy looks with a goofy name and bam! Ridicule city." he shook his head. "I was a very frustrated kit."

"So, what'd you do?"

He grinned. "First, I thought of a new name. The most dramatic name I could think of." he stared off into the distance and spread his paws. "Rumpus Cat. Has a nice ring to it, don't you think?"

"Yeah, Rumpus Cat is an awesome name."

"And then . . ." he paused for effect. "I bought some hair dye."

Pouncival paused. "Uh. . . okay."

"Kid, check out my chest. Do you think my fur grows in this slick 'R" pattern?"

"I guess not." he had never really considered how the "R" got there.

"Yep," the older cat said, tracing the letter fondly with one claw. "I managed to lift some human hair dye and after a bit of trial and error, I made a stencil and every six weeks or so, I give it a little touch up."

"What about the. . ."

"Shades?" Rumpus Cat tapped the glasses perched on his nose. "I got a little help with this one. Mungojerrie and Rumpelteazer got 'em for me. They kinda complete the look, don't you think?"

"Yeah." the kitten said, wistfully.

"So you see, size matters very little."

"That's all well and good for you, but what about me? I can't dye my fur and get sunglasses and call myself . . . Havoc Cat or something."

"Yeah, that wouldn't be horribly original."

"You know what I mean."

Rumpus Cat smiled. "My dear boy. I don't mean that you should try to be me. I mean that you should be you."

Pounce rolled his eyes. "Can't you adults just come out and say what you mean? You always have lessons in stories or some weird metaphor."

"Fine. Be yourself. How's that?"

"But that's the problem! Myself is tiny!"

"Poucival, cats are not large creatures. Well, generally speaking. Look at Munkustrap. He's not exactly Catzilla, and he gets along just fine. Besides, the smaller you are, the more graceful you tend to be."

"I don't wanna be graceful! Vicki's graceful!"

"You want to be acrobatic, right? You want to be quick, right?"

The kitten nodded.

"Well, that ties in to being graceful. It be pretty hard to do a back flip if you were the size of a pollicle."

"Yeah, I guess you're right."

"So you feel better about the whole thing?"

"Some, I guess."

"Good. Let's get you home, hm? Before Munkustrap has a search party going."

Pouncival allowed himself to be led out of the flat and into the streets and finally to the junkyard where they were met by Exotica.

"So, this is where you've been, Pounce?"

"He and I had a little talk." Rumpus Cat said.

"I see. Thanks RC. We were all getting a little concerned." she kissed the black tom lightly on the cheek.

"No problem. See you around, Pounce."

"Thanks!" the kitten said.

Rumpus Cat nodded and then smiled at Exotica before slipping off into the shadows.

"Nice guy." Exotica said lightly, before heading into the 'yard.

Pouncival was thinking about the kiss. Were the two mates? The kiss had seemed pretty chaste. Were they siblings, maybe?

"Uh. . . Exotica?"

"Yes, Pounce?"

"You and Rumpus Cat, are you. . . I mean is he your. . ."

She laughed softly. "That's part of the mystery surrounding me. Everyone needs a little mystery in their lives.

"Yeah, mystery is cool." he said, thinking of the shadowy flat and red sunglasses. "I need to get me some mystery. How do you go about getting all mysterious?"

"You explain very little." she said, eyes sparkling.

"Ah. I got ya. Be all vague and stuff."

"Exactly." she said, as they stepped into the clearing.

Pounce got a good talking to from Munkustrap, Jenny, Jelly and Skimble before he was allowed to play. Tumble and Plato were very eager to hear about where he had been, as neither of them had been outside the junkyard.

The little tom just shrugged. "Oh, you know. Around." he said in his vaguest voice. "Bet I can do a better back flip than you!"

And he did.

~end~


End file.
